BY TORI DEANGELISAs a teenager in Gulfport, Miss., in the early 1970s, Jennifer F. Kelly wasn’t just practicing the typical rites of adolescence. At her parents’ insistence, she was also working the polls,making sure voters stood in the right lines and met the votingrequirements.

Her parents had their reasons for getting her involved: As
community activists, Corine Kelly, a hairdresser who had been raised
as a sharecropper, and Richard Kelly, a courier at Phillips Milk of
Magnesia, understood that African Americans needed to exercise the
vote if they were to achieve equality.

“I saw how much the African American voters believed in the roleof the political process in impacting a change in society,” Kelly says. “Icouldn’t wait to come of voting age so I could vote.”Kelly’s parents also impressed on her the need to further hereducation and work for her community. Over the years, thosevalues produced results. Kelly earned her PhD in 1987 from FloridaState University. After working at a community mental health centertreating underserved clients with a range of health problems andat a pain-management facility at the University of Texas MedicalSchool at Houston, she launched a successful clinical healthpsychology practice, the Atlanta Center for Behavioral Medicine( www.drjenniferkelly.com). There, she uses empirically basedinterventions including cognitive behavioral therapy to help peoplewith obesity, chronic pain, fibromyalgia and other health issues setand meet goals to improve their health and well-being.

“It’s all about helping people find a true quality of life and ahealthy lifestyle,” she says.

She also picked up on her parents’ grassroots political
involvement. That led to a range of leadership positions, including
president of the Georgia Psychological Association (GPA) and
of APA’s Div. 31 (State, Provincial and Territorial Psychological
Association Affairs); a trainer for Leadership Atlanta, the country’s
oldest community leadership program; recording secretary of APA’s